posted
I read A Game of Thrones (George R. R. Martin) recently, and chief among the issues I had with it was the distinct lack of one clearly defined protagonist. It resulted mostly, I think, from the incessant perspective shifts that happened throughout the novel.
I'm not looking for clearly defined "good guys" and "bad guys," I just want to know who the MAIN CHARACTER is, please. I need to know how much to invest in a new character, and in A Game of Thrones I had no way of knowing if the current character would stay alive, let alone central to the story for any length of time. The perspective also shifted, frustratingly often, to unintelligent characters (Sansa most notably) who we already knew were simply being duped. It was irritating, because the end result was that I just didn't care about any of the characters. It was only at the very end of the story, when Daenerys finally did something with her eggs*, that I felt some interest in finding out what was going to happen next.
I had exactly the same problem with The Darkness that Comes Before (R. Scott Bakker, the first book of The Prince of Nothing). The perspective shifts were fewer in number, but still irksome because most of the principal characters were -- and again, the readers were privy to this -- being manipulated by others much of the time. Most annoying was the series' title character, who is utterly devoid of emotion and is simply using the other major characters to further his own ends (don't worry, you learn this right at the beginning). I don't care if he lives, because frankly I don't like him. I can become emotionally invested in evil characters, but not in soulless ones. And since he's the puppeteer directing the other major characters, I have trouble caring about them either.
In between these two books, I read both parts of The Sarantine Mosaic (Guy Gavriel Kay), which was a breath of fresh air. Thankfully, the two books in the series didn't introduce ten thousand incidental characters and didn't shift perspective every ten pages. There was a clear main character, who received sufficient attention and became quite complex over the course of the books. There were other major characters as well, fleshed out to varying degrees as merited by their role in the story.
If I can read more than a couple of hundred pages in a book (let alone more than five hundred, which was the case here) without being able to figure out who the main character is, I think there's something wrong with the book. Does anyone else find this as irritating as I do?
*And honestly, who hadn't seen that coming for three hundred pages?
posted
After The Darkness that Comes Before, I've gone running back to Kay again (The Last Light of the Sun). And guess what? Chapter one is over, and I have myself at least one major character.
posted
It may be just us two. Everyone I know loves Song of Ice and Fire and looks all confused when I express less than rabid enthusiasm over the 4th books possible publication.
I went running into the arms of Zelazny's Amber series (which I'd somehow managed to never read). There we go. Back to loving reading.
Posts: 3956 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
I borrowed A Game of Thrones from BtL, who claimed to have enjoyed it. So it may well be just the two of us.
Kay doesn't really count as fantasy, either (aside from his first trilogy, The Fionvar Tapestry, which is OK but nothing to rave about). His settings typically draw heavily on historical periods with some fantasy elements incorporated into them, rather than the other way around. There's nary a hint of Tolkien in his non-Fionvar work.
Edit:
>> I sometimes enjoy not having clearly defined protagonists << (PG)
I find I can't get into a story unless I know which characters merit emotional investment. If there are a billion characters of equal importance, chances are I just won't care about any of them rather than caring a little bit about all of them. I like to get to know a character, which takes time. A Game of Thrones didn't give me that time with any of the characters.
posted
He's one I've been meaning to get around to, but that's a long list.
I was given the first three last year as a birthday gift. Bill enjoyed them. I'm going to keep putting off the second one.
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posted
When you do get to Kay, The Sarantine Mosaic is a good place to start -- though I think those two books are now my favourites of his, supplanting even Tigana (which I loved).
After The Last Light of the Sun, though, I'm not sure what I'm going to read.
Edit:
Xav, I said in my first post that it's not a "good guy" that I need, just that I need a book to have some focus -- even if it's the first book of a series. Characters are what make me care about events. There can be lots of momentous events happening in a rich world, but I have a hard time caring unless the principal characters have been given enough time. In A Game of Thrones they definitely weren't given anywhere near enough time, because it isn't even clear who they are. Daenerys and Jon Snow were the closest, but neither was involved in any of the events that the book purported to be about.
posted
Ugh. That isn't the only alternative. Plenty of other books manage to hold our interest without such clearly defined "good" and "evil" while not managing to be so ADD about it.
Posts: 3956 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
If you take the POVs of Jon and Dany over the three books so far, they both add up to at least a 200 page book each.
Really, they might not be for you, some people need to be spoonfed.
The rest of us will like them just fine.
(and for Val and anyone else watching, me and celia have known eachother long enough for a heated debate without taking it personally, at least I am pretty sure )
posted
Did I not already say that everyone else loves them?
Why the hell should I have to invest the time to read 3 substantial sized novels just to gain interest when I could spend, say, 3 pages on a book by (oh, off the top of my head) Jamie Taylor and already care about the characters?
It's just not worth my time.
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posted
I cared about Will on the first page and wondered for the rest of the book why Martin couldn't manage to write another character so well so briefly.
posted
To me you two are basically complaining that you're complaining that your five star restaurant filet mignon doesn't taste nearly as good as your McDonalds hamburger.
posted
More like we can't taste the fillet through the shitty sauce, and don't understand why we can't get just the steak done well without having to eat the rest.
BTW, Xav, I'm not attacking you with any genuine malice. Just your atrocious taste.
This does, though, bring us to another (possibly related) issue -- gargantuan, sprawling, epic stories. Xav suggested that maybe I just don't like those, but my love for The Lord of the Rings shows that isn't true. Martin's epic, though, sprawls even more than Tolkien's; by the end of A Game of Thrones it isn't even clear what exactly the series is about. Kay's style is to show the movements behind the epic, small events that go on to have huge effects, rather than writing directly about the big things. That might be another part of what I like about his work.
But the issue of protagonists is still, I think, my biggest problem with Martin. It's either an issue of focus or, as Celia suggests, one of character.
Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000
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quote:It may be just us two. Everyone I know loves Song of Ice and Fire and looks all confused when I express less than rabid enthusiasm over the 4th books possible publication.
*raises hand*
I didn't finish the first book. I was reading it last fall, and I got busy with finals and never got back around to it. The characters (notably the lack of a main one) was just one of the things that annoyed me, though.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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The Fire and Ice series is not about the characters, but about how the society radically changes because of the events. To show all the events, Martin had decided on multiple characters, who can be in multiple locations and so can witness the multiple significant events.
It is like doing a novel about World War II. If you have only one significant character, you have greatly limited your scope.
Of course, the drawback is that you can't closely identify with any one particular character. (And let me assure you, if you hate seeing your character die, don't.) It is far more like a soap opera in that respect, with almost as much sex, but way more nasty violence.
But he does populate his novels with (IMHO) interesting characters, so the lack of any one to identify with is not that big of a drawback. Also, all the nasty things he does to his characters may make it an advantage!
So if a grand-scale series is not for you, that is OK. But understand that it is because Martin is working on a grand scale, and so cannot be limited to a single main protagonist. There is just way too much going on.
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posted
I was also annoyed by his inconsistent and obnoxious quasi-archaisms. What's up with "maester" and "ser"? Why use "gaoler" instead of "jailer"? And why does everybody need to say "would that I could" every other page?
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posted
I'm not going to bash Ice and Fire, because I like the series. I like it a lot.
But I don't gush about it to the extent that others do. It's not the greatest thing since sliced bread, or even since LOTR. And it really isn't THAT much better than Robert Jordan, either.
And I agree with Twinky, Celia and Jon Boy in that characterization has been one thing that has bothered me. I've already written at least one post on Hatrack expressing my confusion about the "main character(s)" in the series. I don't think it's as serious a flaw as Twinky does, but it could be better.
Posts: 1652 | Registered: Aug 2003
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posted
Just to annoy you - love this series - for the reason you don't.
mini spoiler if you haven't read first book
But I must admit that I was horrified towards the end of the first book when the father died - but I've loved getting to know lots of characters in a lot more depth than normal. I thought it was interesting to see how they develop - especially the shallow ones like Sansa - its like real life - some people are shallow or naive until life throws them a curve ball and drags them into reality.
I've also enjoyed seeing the same event from various perspectives - it really makes things multi-dimensional. But I think you need to read more than the first book to fully get this.
I've really come to like the main characters - I know what you're saying about the first book but main characters do emerge - it just takes longer than most other writers I know.
And yes I'm excited about the next one coming out - I was horrified last week when I went into the bookshop to find out its not being published until June - it was originally scheduled for February and I was hoping to get the paperback in June. Damn writers can't keep to schedule - disgusting - I'm gonna have to buy it in hardback now.
posted
There's remarkably little sex in the book, and it's not explicit at all. While not as sexless as, say, LotR, it's considerably less sexy than the Iliad. Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
I'm a prude too. I stopped reading the second book in the middle of a scene that was describing oral sex with more detail than I was comfortable with.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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posted
It didn't stop me reading the books - I just skimmed over the worst bits - I'm one of those people who has to finish a book once I start reading it - even if I'm struggling.
Posts: 394 | Registered: Feb 2004
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The more twink and I recommend books to each other the more we're going to discover how much our tastes differ. I really enjoy Martin because of all the characters and how well they illustrate the ripples one event can cause. I love how complicated his characters are, even though I admit it took more than the first book to totally warm up to them. I also like that I'm afraid when bad things are going on because I don't know if everyone's going to make it out unscathed. I like reading about bad things happening to good people
But I totally understand where Raja's coming from, that's fine. I got a kick out of how he said in an E-mail that it plods and suffers from the same symptomes as Tolkein's Fellowship where I thought that was the only one of the Rings books worth reading
As for [i]Tigana[/i,] it's on my list of books that are enjoyable despite the author's best efforts to ruin it. Frankly, I loathe how Kay develops characters and finds it necessary to beat me over the head with the same sentiment every other line. Apparently Raja has a poor short term memory and needs to be reminded that a character is sad over and over and over again (using almost the exact same words) I was ready for it to end when it finally did, but the idea behind it is so original that I'd still recommend it to most people.
Oh, and I agree that complicated plots don't make good stories by default, but needlessly complicated sentances don't make for good writing either!
/my author is better than your author and my dad can beat up your dad.
Posts: 3243 | Registered: Apr 2002
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posted
>> You know, that's one of the beautiful things about it. << (Tom)
In that case, where's the draw to keep reading it? I guess if you just want to read about big events as seen through the eyes of whoever happens to be closest to each one, that's fine. But then why do you care about the events? Why does what's happening matter? I'd much rather care about the people involved.
>> Some people like to have their jigsaw puzzles come pre-assembled, I suppose. <<
A plot that focuses on a relatively small number of detailed characters doesn't have to be simple as a result; it just means that the focus is on the characters rather than on the events... or on how the events affect the characters rather than how the characters influence the events.
That, I suppose, is the crux of the difference between people who liked A Game of Thrones and people who didn't... between people like me and people like BtL, it seems.
BtL,
Pfft. Needlessly complicated senteces, my ass. Actually, another reason I like him is that I write like he does -- commas, semicolons, parentheses, hyphens...
Our tastes must differ. You read The Wheel of Time.
However, if you really do like Martin, I'll bring The Darkness that Comes Before back to Toronto with me. It isn't bad, though it wasn't what I was hoping for (which was Lovecraft).
Speaking of which... *goes off to start a thread about Lovecraft*
posted
Well, I guess I am even stranger than most, as Martin AND Kay are two of my all-time fav authors.
But the are very different in their approaches to writing, that is for sure. I LOVED Tigana, (BTW, how is Tigana NOT fantasy?) and loved how the characters enjoyed music the same way I do, and I loved the Italian feel of the whole setting. I loved the Summer Tree, as it is one of the few books where I had a real connection to the characters. I loved Paul, and I felt he surprised me with the resolution of both the Fionavar series and Tigana.
I like Martin mostly because his series seems real to me, and he infuriates me. I do care about the characters, both the good and the bad ones, and I like his character development. I hate the deaths, and it does make it hard to become emotionally invested in the books. After all, why bother caring if they will die so easily. But the deaths provide something that is usually missing in most fantasy series...actual consequences. If a character messe up, he pays for it, possibly with his life. In most series, the main protagonist is invulnerable to death, at least until the last book. After all, is he dies, who will be in the next book? (think Harry Potter here)
posted
You leave the Wheel of Time out of this! *ashamed* It's like cotton candy, only not as yummy and worse for me.
But I think I should defend my point on his sentence structure. I got the impression that he's intentionally writing so it sounds like a bard's tale. And that's fine, I don't even mind losing some clarity for the sake of prose here and there, heck, I'm a fan of Ondaatje after all. But the problem with writing so stylistically is that when you drop the ball it jars the reader and reminds them that they're reading a book, not listening to a story being told. Kay drops the ball several times. The first few times I thought he was just trying to draw attention to the sentence (though I couldn't imagine why) but then I realized it was just his failing as a writer.
As opposed to my failings as the reader, which clearly isn't possible
And, come on, The Night's Guard? What the hell was up with that? Even by the end of the book I hadn't forgiven him for that mangled section of the book.
Posts: 3243 | Registered: Apr 2002
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posted
"But then why do you care about the events?"
I find it odd that it's necessary for you to focus on a single character in order to care about him. Martin's viewpoint chapters are as long as a typical short story and generally as self-contained; are you saying that you don't normally wind up caring about the protagonist in any short story? Or is it that, when you're reading, you like a clear neon finger pointing down from the sky at somebody, saying, "This is our hero. Do not skim pages in which he appears?"
Even now, Martin's readers don't yet know whether we should care about the new lord of the Iron Islands, or whether we're ever going to see a confrontation with beasties north of the Wall, or even if Tyrion is a hero or a villain. And the great thing about this, as far as I'm concerned, is that it means you CAN'T be lazy; you absolutely CANNOT pigeonhole Tyrion, or write off some minor character simply because he seems like he's there to provide a bit of color, because Martin comes back and hangs a whole subplot on him three hundred pages later.
In this respect, it's considerably more like, well, life.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
Umm... I like Kay and Martin. While Martin does have more characters I always feel like Kay has you at least invested at 4 at any given time. And you can't say you want to know that a character suddenly isn't going to die and then say you like Kay. I mean.... that's why he's so great.
I can see how it would be harder to grow attatched to to Martin's characters. Although I find that some of them are still easy to grow attatched to. I love his complex world in the same way I love Kay's complex characters and relationships.
I think I'm running out of stuff of Kay's to read though. I just need to get my hands on the newest one. Oh and as far as favorite Kay, definately Lions of Al Rassan. Although, that was also the first one I read.
Posts: 872 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
>> I find it odd that it's necessary for you to focus on a single character in order to care about him. Martin's viewpoint chapters are as long as a typical short story and generally as self-contained; are you saying that you don't normally wind up caring about the protagonist in any short story? Or is it that, when you're reading, you like a clear neon finger pointing down from the sky at somebody, saying, "This is our hero. Do not skim pages in which he appears?" <<
It doesn't have to be one single character, but less than ten thousand at once would be nice. When I read a short story I know that this is all the time I'm going to have with this character, so it's possible to become emotionally invested. But with Martin's style, I wind up more focused on what is happening than on who is doing it and why I should care about them.
Take Tyrion, who you mention in your post. He could be a real, compelling character if Martin would just spend more time writing from his perspective, showing us more of his thoughts and what motivates him to do the things that he does. Instead, we only stay with him long enough for some key event to happen, then we're off with someone else where some other key event is happening. Tyrion isn't a "good guy" or a "bad guy," he's just a person, but he could be a terrific main character.
IMO, the reader doesn't have to witness every single event in every single plot line in the story. In fact, I'd much rather see what happens when an important character hears about an event (in terms of how that character reacts and is affected) than see the event happen through the eyes of a minor character.
This reminds me of how Leto and I differ with regard to Ender's Game and the Shadow series. He likes the Shadow series because of the politics and wars and manipulation of events; I dislike the Shadow series because I don't find any of the characters as compelling as Ender. He finds Ender whiny and overly introspective, agonizing over every little thing... while this introspection is precisely why I like Ender so much.
>> Even now, Martin's readers don't yet know whether we should care about the new lord of the Iron Islands, or whether we're ever going to see a confrontation with beasties north of the Wall, or even if Tyrion is a hero or a villain. And the great thing about this, as far as I'm concerned, is that it means you CAN'T be lazy; you absolutely CANNOT pigeonhole Tyrion, or write off some minor character simply because he seems like he's there to provide a bit of color, because Martin comes back and hangs a whole subplot on him three hundred pages later. <<
[spoilers]
If, for example, Martin had spent more time with Ned Stark, his exectuion would have affected me emotionally. It would have hurt, and I would have been very impressed with him for making me feel something. Instead, I thought "well, I guess now the kid gets to sit on the throne for at least a while longer... oh, and too bad for Arya, I suppose."
[/spoilers]
I don't need the story to necessarily focus on the "good guys," I just need time to get to know the characters. Jumping back and forth between them in short-story-sized excerpts when your book is some 800 pages long just means that by the time you get back to someone you may well have forgotten the last thing they did. If the jumps were less frequent and/or between fewer characters... honestly, if he'd just linger for once, I might be more interested in finding out what happens next. Daenerys came close, but the gaps between her segments got to be so long that by the time we came back to her I felt like I was reading a different book.
>> In this respect, it's considerably more like, well, life. <<
I am my life's protagonist. I know myself very well. If I want history -- a dispassionate discussion of events unfolding in a world -- I may as well read about the history of the real world. I go to fiction for compelling stories, and compelling characters are IMO what makes compelling stories.
_________________________
BtL, if you think about Tigana* for a sec, you'll realize why I found it so deeply compelling. Think about my background for a moment.
I actually found the Night Walkers of Certando to be fascinatingly original. The whole Ember Days sequence, actually -- Devin's night with Alienor, Baerd and the Night Walkers -- struck me as outright beautiful because of the dreamlike feel Kay achieves with his prose. One of my favourite parts of the book.
__________________________
I didn't think A Game of Thrones was bad (nor The Darkness that Comes Before), and I don't think Kay is the greatest author ever to write anything; it just so happened that I read these four books one after the other and was struck by my reaction to the different writing. Sarahdipity summed it up pretty well; I just like Martin less than she does.
__________________________
*As an aside, Tigana is definitely fantasy, but Kay's subsequent writing is really a sort of "historical fantasy;" the fantasy elements are much less pronounced.
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posted
We're coming at this from different angles, Raja. The reasons why you like Tigana aren't lost on me. That doesn't change the fact that I found the writing to be awkward in places. So much so that reading it irritated me and I became more concerned about the writing than I was about the characters. And like I said earlier, he repeats things over, and over, and over, and over again over 3 or 4 pages. I understand using repetition to drive a point home, but he goes way overboard with it.
The Night's Guard was interesting and hadn't been done before but it felt more like a separate idea Kay had that he was looking to fit into a story somehow and for whatever reason he picked Tigana. While it was necessary for Baerd to change (and that's really the only reason the sequence was necessary) I found it an incredibly awkward way to go about doing it.
Of course, this isn't supposed to be a thread about Tigana is it?
Edit for clarity
Oh, and edited for this:
On an unrelated note, I bought Absolution the other day and love it. So I guess we can still be friends.
[ May 18, 2004, 11:02 AM: Message edited by: Bob the Lawyer ]
Posts: 3243 | Registered: Apr 2002
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posted
You know, that's weird, because I didn't find that at all.
Edit:
I also liked the Night Walkers because they gave me a hint of a larger world beyond the scope of what's directly in the main thrust of the story, and I appreciated that.
I'm starting to wonder if maybe our difference is stylistic rather than related to focus. I like Kay's prose more than Martin's, while you dislike Kay's prose... and that's before we even get to the issue of focus on characters versus focus on events.
Glad you like Absolution, though. What a great record...
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I just need to get my hands on the newest one. Oh and as far as favorite Kay, definately Lions of Al Rassan. Although, that was also the first one I read.
